Tips, tricks and eCommerce inspiration from WooCommerce experts.

If you plan on selling any products or services via the internet, you need to make sure that people can actually find you.

There’s no sense in having a fancy website with the best products at awesome prices if your site can’t be found after the first page in Google. Few people will take the time necessary to look that far.

This is where your SEO efforts come into play. Rank higher in the search engines and people are more likely to find you. The more traffic you get, the more likely you are to make sale after sale. After all, isn’t that why you’re in this business in the first place?

Here are 10 tips to help you maximize your SEO efforts to help create a strong presence on the internet.

Don’t believe me? Think about the last time you were in a physical store that you frequent.

It likely had good aesthetics and a large part of that has to do with the selection of an appealing color scheme. The colors a store chooses should reflect both the products and the emotions the company wants to evoke from its customers. It’s about using human psychology to make a sale.

Is this all sounding a bit confusing? Not to worry. I often find starting with an example to be best.

When entering into the world of e-commerce – retail, specifically – it might come as a surprise just how important social media really is.

I mean, you probably understand that you need to have a presence on the major sites like Facebook and Twitter, but did you know that recent research shows that Instagram is a serious engagement booster for online brands? I’m talking a 25% boost here, and that’s definitely not something to sneeze at.

Pinterest is important, too, don’t get me wrong. Especially when dealing in tangible, visually-oriented products. But Instagram is a social tidal wave and it would behoove you to set sail, like, yesterday.

I know I don’t have to tell you how important social media is to your success online.

It doesn’t matter what kind of business you run; law firms, consultancies, and retailers alike have all found social media to be an invaluable tool for building brand awareness and creating a loyal follower base.

As an online store owner, it’s imperative to have a social presence. But I’m not here to convince you of such. In fact, I’m confident that you know this already. Rather, what I question is whether your social campaign is as effective as it could be. Are you really knocking it out of the park, or could it use some work?

There’s nothing like learning from the best to get your campaign up and running, right? Here are four brands who are absolutely killing it on social media right now. Check out what they’ve done and I dare you to tell me you didn’t walk away inspired!

If you already have an e-commerce business or you’re thinking about setting one up, it’s likely that you have at least a cursory familiarity with email lists. A well-built email list gives you access to your most loyal potential and current customers at any time. And so long as you respect that level of access, you’ll be rewarded with increased conversions.

There are several analogies for referring to the sales cycle but I like the “funnel” best. At the top is anyone person that makes it to your site. The middle is reserved for those who’ve interacted with your site or brand in a direct way. They’ve read your blog or input their email address in an opt-in form. At the very bottom of the funnel – the narrowest part – is those who decide to put their money on the line and buy your product or service.

It pretty much doesn’t matter what kind of website you have – the search function is going to be important.

Comprehensive search allows visitors to navigate your site on their own terms and I think this is especially important when it comes to e-commerce sites. Online stores often feature numerous product pages which can be a bit cumbersome to click through conventional navigation methods alone.

So, search is important. But how do you give your online store’s search box the boost it needs to level up? Here are a few ideas…

A lot of the time when lists like this are put together, the emphasis is usually placed on small business blogs that talk about how to run and manage a business. And while such lists are certainly useful, I thought it would be a good idea to put together a list of blogs actually created and managed by retail store owners. These blogs don’t talk about how to blog; rather, they show how it’s done and lead by example.

Here are 15 retail blogs I’ve come across that are run by small shop owners (for the most part) that can give you some real-life inspiration when putting together a blog for your e-commerce site.

1. Taylor Stitch

Taylor Stitch is an online and brick and mortar clothing shop for both men and women and they’ve really got a handle on this blogging business.

They have a dedicated Journal, which paints verbal and visual portraits of their products in action. It has a narrative style that’s rather engaging, which breaks up the occasional product post.

Well, testing allows you to see precisely what elements of your online store are effective and which ones leave room for improvement. They show you which call-to-action drives the most conversions and which one is dead on arrival. A/B testing allows you to tweak, fiddle, and fuss with your site in the best possible way.

Having a good product or service is your best bet for running a successful online store. But how you present that product or service plays a major role in how it is received by your target audience and whether or not you’ll see your conversion rate slope upwards.

Yep, I’m talking about web design here. You obviously want a site that looks good, but there are some specific things you need to pay attention to if you want to boost sales on your e-commerce site.

Delving into the world of e-commerce is an exciting prospect. You get to sell your goods online and participate in building something from scratch. Those are two ideas worth getting excited about if you ask me.

Still, it’s not wise to jump in head first without a plan of action. Whether you build your site on WordPress or another platform – using WooCommerce or without – you need to have a few essential things in place before you hang that digital “Open” sign and process your first transaction.

It’s not enough to build an e-commerce site, cross your fingers, and hope people will visit it. It’d be pretty nice if that were the case but unfortunately, it isn’t. Rather, you need to do some legwork if you want to rack up the number of people that visit your site. And you need to do even more legwork if you want to see those visitors actually enter your sales funnel and convert by making a purchase.

By running your e-commerce site on WordPress, you have a large selection of tools available to you that will make optimizing for conversion easier. However, identifying the right tools for your store and your specific needs can feel like a challenge. This is especially the case if this is your first foray into the world of e-commerce.